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Business model design

Business Models

How to Find Your Business Model

Business Modeling, the Game TL;DR Yes, you are living in a simulation How you die = punt on the business model Game progression = vital decisions leading to actions that unlock new business models Your reserves = courageluck:capital How to win the game: see the system levers, to take on the goliaths, to build a world with intended consequences I am in Montréal for StartupFest, one of the best startup Read More

Facebook FY 2018 Free Business Model Advice for Mark Z.

This is the second in the Tech Titans Series. Sign up to get the most recent Tech Titans and upcoming reports. We turn our attention to Facebook’s 2018 Year End financials. Did you give up Facebook after the privacy, democracy, and lobbying issues Facebook faced last year? Well, you didn’t put a dent in their financials. Yet as Facebook turns 15 this year, let’s give some free business model advice Read More

Nobody Wants 2019 Vision

No More Predictions Please: What’s Your Range of Possibility for 2019 It’s time for new year’s predictions. But 2019 is too difficult a year to try to envision in comparison to the year that comes next. 2020 was the even year in our sights for the last 20 years. 2020 represented a horizon line in the future. 20/20 vision. A time when all would become clear. Were we right? Were Read More

Data is Not Oil – Data is Love

Why do we still keep using the metaphors of the industrial age to describe the opportunities we see? Data is not oil. Data was not formed over millions of years. Data was not extracted from deep underneath the earth’s crust. Data is not derived from the fossilized remains of dead organisms. Notice the words we use: We extract data. We mine data. We monetize data. We plumb the depths of Read More

Alphabet: Has Google Solved the Big Company Growth Trap?

This is the third in our series on FANG company business model narratives, including Facebook and Netflix (check next week for Amazon). Typically, when companies get big, extremely mega big, $100 BN revenues big, they start to slow down. Google is not slowing down. Companies built on technology follow an S curve of growth. At the start of the curve, adoption is slow and development costs are high. At the inflection point of growth, Read More

The Facebook Narrative: Advertising to the Max

Is there any room for business model diversification? Yesterday Facebook announced a re-org of their management team to improve communication and put more accountability for privacy decisions. But the company also needed a reorg to deal with the growing complexity of their business. We all thought we understood Facebook’s advertising business model until it started to reveal itself to us following the Cambridge Analytica scandal. Look under the hood at Read More

The Netflix Narrative: Subscription Superstar

Swerving and pivoting a business model story for customer joy and massive shareholder value  Thinking of a switch to a subscription model? We have much to learn from the swerves and pivots of today’s leading subscription company: Netflix. Of the top 5 tech companies, only Netflix depends entirely on a subscription revenue model for success, keeping it free and clear from impending regulatory threats for data usage with advertisers. “NFLX Read More

Predicting the Preposterous: Scenario Planning the End of Advertising

  One day, Mark Zuckerberg, Sergey Brin, and Larry Page woke up and realized they were in the advertising business. And they were sad. All of that technical prowess, all of those high IQ Stanford grads, all of that bold experimentation to optimize people buying more stuff. Sergey and Larry did something about it. They aimed at moonshots: internet balloons, working Tricorders, self-driving vehicles, eternal life, energy kites. In 2015 Read More

2018: The Year Wall Street Became Socially Active

A call to articulate your long-term view We have this story we tell in business: a vicious loop of misaligned expectations and unrealized dreams. Investors, we tell ourselves, want short-term quarterly results. Visionaries have no place in large public companies because all decisions are optimized for the short term win. Unicorns, companies valued at a billion dollars or more, shy away from their IPO and public spotlight. Startup founders aim Read More

2018: The Year We Unlearned

Let’s start this year with a beginner’s mind. Tap into our rookie smarts. Shed the crustiest skin. Slough away the thickest callouses. Admit, for once, that we don’t know how this year is going to unfold: more unprecedented weather, politics, business transformation, and cultural change. A recent study published by NC State’s Management School revealed key risks and concerns of board members and senior execs in 2018. #1 on the list: The Read More